


Three days straight!

by NovemberWings



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jack loves Race, Or if you squint it could be slash? If you want?, Past Child Abuse, Platonically, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 02:38:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18002225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NovemberWings/pseuds/NovemberWings
Summary: Race spend three days at Brooklyn with no word to the Manhatten boys. When he returns he gets a lecture of Jack for scaring them so much. Things turn bad quickly.“Did you just…” Jack’s voice sounded strained, “you thought… I was going to hit you.”





	Three days straight!

 “Honestly Race you can’t do things like this!” Jack shouted at Race. Race was standing, head down staring down at the floor, in front of Jack. “You really think it’s okay to stay at Brooklyn for three days straight! With no word?” There was a beat of silence and Race suddenly found the floor the most interesting thing in the world.

“Look at me Race.” His tone still angry. Race reluctantly raised his head to see an angry looking Jack scowling down at him. “We thought you were dead!”

 

He didn’t know what to say to that, he just stared fearfully up at Jack. Jack had been angry at him before but never to this extent. He was red in the face and shaking with anger. He looked like… but Race stopped that train of thought. He didn’t need to be thinking of that.

“You got nothin’ to say?”

“I-“ but he felt himself choke. He was scared. He didn’t know what to do or say to diffuse the situation, but apparently that wasn’t the right thing to say. Jack scoffed angrily, raising his hand and before Race could think he flinched back violently.

 

He felt his back make contact with the wall, his violent flinch making him smack the back of his head off the brick wall of the alley they were in. He closed his eyes, part in a pained grimace and part in a frightened grimace. He tensed himself up and waited with his eyes closed for a few seconds before nothing happened and he decided to slowly open his eyes.

 

He glanced up at Jack who was frozen in a horrified stillness.

“Did you just…” Jack’s voice sounded strained, “you thought… I was going to hit you.” Race blinked up at him with fear. He didn’t understand. He was one hundred percent sure that Jack was going to soak hi, Beat the hell out of him. Why isn’t he? Why is he drawing it out. His throat felt tight and he didn’t know if it was because he was scared or about to cry.

“You’re scared of me.” Jack took another step back and reached up, rubbing a hand over his face.

“No… I’m not scared of you.” Race shook his head, his voice tense. He truly wasn’t scared of Jack, he was scared of the beating he was about to receive, and he hated himself for it. He knew he shouldn’t be scared of a beating, his Pa always said that.

“ _You should take a beating like a man, Antonio_.” His cruel chuckle echoed around his mind. “ _Practise makes perfect, Tony. If you need to be beaten more to understand how to take it, I’ll happily oblige_.” He laughed as he pulled his belt out of his loop holes and raised the buckle end in the air.

 

“Oh really, Race?” Jack scoffed, hysterical with emotion, “because last time I checked people don’t _flinch_ away from people they ain’t scared of.” Jack took another step back.

“Jack,” Race started, “I ain’t scared of ya. Really.” He took a step closer to him.

“Well then why you flinchin’?” His voice torn with distress. Race felt his face go red and he looked down in shame, but he knew he’d have to explain. Say the condemning words.

“I was scared of… the beating.” He felt a shamed blush possess his cheeks. He wanted the ground to swallow him up. But mostly he just wanted Jack to beat him and get it over with so he can lick his wounds.

“Scared of the beating?” Jack asked making Race flinch again.

“I know. I know I’m not supposed to be scared of a beatin’. I try not to be,” he felt a unwilling tear run down his cheek, he quickly wipes it away shamefully, “but I can’t help it. I… it just… hurts an’ it scares me. Sorry.” And then a few more tears fell. He tried wiping them away in vain, as soon as one was wiped away another would take its place. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He apologised repeatedly.

“Race.” Jack took a step towards him with his hands out but then paused and dropped his hands by his sides again. “I’m not going to beat you. I would never beat you.”

“But-“ Race was about to argue but he cut himself off. Now wasn’t the time to be asking questions, he should just accept whatever was about to happen to him.

“But what?” Jack said, his voice increasingly gentle, it was raking on his nerves.

“You… you raised your hand?” Race spluttered out in confusion as he mirrored Jack’s gesture from before, “To hit me.”

“No.” Jack shook his head slowly, “I was pushing my hair out of my face.”

“Oh.” Race said dumbly before letting out a sob. He was so emotionally exhausted.

“Come ‘ere.” Jack said opening his arms for Race. Race hesitantly stepped into his arms. Despite the fact that Jack only gently held him he couldn’t relax his tense muscles so Jack started rubbing his back as he cried quietly, wetting Jack’s shirt. “You’re alright, Race. I ain’t gonna beat ya. I would never hurt you.” He said gently and then just held him in silence as he calmed down.

 

After a while Race had calmed down and Jack proposed they sit against the wall, so that’s what they did.

“Race… why’d you apologise for being scared?”

“What?” He dumbly asked, his brain felt foggy and if his world were on a ten second delay.

“Earlier you kept saying sorry for being scared of being beaten. Why?”

 

Race paused awkwardly. Most kids came from a troubled home but he rarely talked about his, but now he was going to have to and suddenly he forgot every English word he knew.

“My Pa… when he beat me he used to get angry when I cried or begged him to stop.” He surprised himself about how numb the words sounded while his heart beat like a tattoo in his chest, “He used to tell me that I should take a beatin’ like a man… but I’m still scared and I knows I shouldn’t be but I am.” He shrugged feeling embarrassed at his own weakness.

“You know that a crock of shit, right?”

“What?”

“That you shouldn’t be scared.” Race scoffed at that. “Seriously you should be scared when you’re about to fight or be beaten. Davey was tellin’ me it’s somethin’ to do with a chemical in us called adrenaline.” Jack shrugged, clearly unable to elaborate further on that. “You Pa sounds like he was full of bullshit.”

“Probably. I mean he did enough nasty shit he might as well be a liar on top a that.” Race shrugged. He was tired he needed to go to sleep.

 

“Look, Jackie.” He started, “I’m sorry for getting you so upset about my flinchin’ an’ all. But you gotta know that I ain’t scared of you.” Race said genuinely, knocking his shoulder gently into Jack’s. “To tell the truth… the hand movement you did it looked like what Pa used to look like and it must have set something off in me.” There was a moment of silence and Race realised how much he had revealed.

“I’m sorry Racer. Really. I’m real sorry. I never want to hurt you.”

“I know.” Race shrugged and Jack sent him a glance before reaching over and gently ruffling his hair like he has always done since he first saw Race on the street. Race laughed at the amiable contact and it genuinely calmed him down really fast, dissipating the last of his nerves.

“But seriously though, Race. You gotta give us some warning if yous going to be staying over there that long.”

“I know. It won’t happen again. Promise.” He spat into his hand and offered it to Jack, who grinned cheekily at him and then copied his action before they shook hands. “I think I needs to go to bed, Jackie.” Race smiled dozily at him.

“Same here.” Jack smiled back.


End file.
